Incomplete Citizenship of the Plantation Community: Access to Governance Institutions and
Public Service Delivery
human potential and realise their life goals. However, as we
see in Sri Lanka, many laws and policies have historically been
explicit in singling out specific groups for favourable treatment
and limiting or denying another section to enjoy social rights.
In such contexts, formal citizenship may continue to remain as
a nominal entitlement. As indicated in the Human Development
Report 2016 (UNDP 2016), this kind of detrimental treatment
mainly takes place based on identity, social class, and profession
or based on their ascribed characteristics. It is not the only driver
of exclusion, but also subverts social citizenship, human capability
and rule of law in particular, and quality of government in general.
One could also argue that institutions cannot be understood
simply through their formal rules, since actual practices often
differ from these rules. Institutional behaviour is dynamic, taking
different shapes based on discretionary power, informal networks,
and relationships. For instance, there are formal rules and
regulations which generally prohibit bribes and unethical practices
in the working of public institutions in Sri Lanka, but “rules in use
or informal practices” commonly require a bribe in exchange for
service delivery. Thus institutions are more likely to produce and
reproduce social and power inequalities by serving only those who
fulfil certain informal requirements, perpetuating entrenched
discrepancies in terms of gender, ethnicity, race, caste, religion,
and so forth. This simply indicates how formal institutions are
structured by informal networks, power, relationships, and elite
capture.
Public institutions often claim to be serving all citizens with
common goods and services, but they actually reproduce unequal
relationships and tend to marginalise the needs and demands of
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